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 Adams Hotel - Lavina, MT Posted by:  T0SHEA
N 46° 17.726 W 108° 56.288
12T E 658801 N 5128939
A genuine rarity, this is a hotel that was also a church. The fact that it is/was also haunted seems less of a rarity.
Waymark Code: WMWAE8
Location: Montana, United States
Date Posted: 08/02/2017
Views: 1
One of the 580 or so citizens of Lavina buried in the Lavina Cemetery is Emanual Dolt, an immigrant from Switzerland who arrived in the US around the turn of the twentieth century. According to his grave marker, Emanual was born on January 27, 1877, Emanual died at the age of 40 on March 25, 1927 and is buried here in the cemetery. Details within the following account differ from those on his gravestone.
It turns out that Emanual was buried here against his will; he had wanted his remains returned to his homeland, Switzerland. Another little tidbit about Emanual, or "Manny", as he was known: he was for many years a ghost who haunted the Adams Hotel, a National Historic Register hotel in Lavina.
The Adams Hotel, built in 1908 within a year of the Milwaukee Road's arrival, is a huge two-story Colonial Revival style building seemingly standing in the middle of nowhere. While the hotel survived, on and off, for many years, it was simply too ambitious an establishment for the size of town that Lavina grew to be. Early hopes were that the town would grow to be a major supply centre in the area, given that it was on the Milwaukee Road. Though early success inspired the owner to expand in 1911, by the 1920s drought descended on Montana, quickly reversing any growth experienced. As a result Lavina became a minor supply centre, never again growing sufficiently to require a hotel as grand and as large as The Adams.
The American Lutheran Church of Lavina formed their own congregation in 1930 and bought and moved into the Adams Hotel. They remained there until 1973, at which time the high cost of maintaining and operating the large two story building forced the congregation to sell the building and move into the Lavina Methodist Church to share it with the Methodists. Sometime after the Lutherans vacated it, the hotel was bought by Raymond Barry, who began a restoration, but was unable to complete it. His story follows.
Manny immigrated from Switzerland to Boston, Mass. in the late eighteen hundreds. He married and had a son born in 1900, in Boston, Mass. The son was also named Emanuel Dolt.
Eighty seven years ago, in February 1927, Emanuel "Manny" Dolt, died in room #2, of the Adams Hotel. He was fifty seven years of age, at the time of his death. He was employed as a cook for the family of the hotel owner the Lefheldts . Manny and the hotel owner Louie were good friends, and in a conversation on one occasion, Manny gave instructions as to what he would like done , in the event of his death. He DID NOT want to buried in the local cemetery at Lavina, Montana ! He wanted his remains shipped back to Switzerland, to his widowed mother, and buried on his home turf...
The hotel closed after the banks failed, in 1923. Manny was homeless, as the Lefhleds were forced to leave the hotel, and rent a smaller home. Louie gave Manny permission to live in the hotel, but the heat had been shut off. In early February, 1927, Manny retired to his room, after enjoying some libation of sorts. He must have failed to cover himself with blankets,, caught pneumonia and was found dead in his room, when they came to check on him. Louie wrote to Manny's mother and received a reply. She was living on a widow's pension, and could not afford to ship his remains to Switzerland. She requested of Louie to have him buried in the Lavina cemetery, and she would send the money, as soon as she could muster it . Louie did as she requested and purchased a white Carrara Marble cross, with Manny' birth and death dates The only such marker in the cemetery. Louie was in financial stress as well, and lost the hotel in 1930 , for six hundred dollars in back taxes. The town fathers covertly sold it to the Lutheran Church of Bellmont, a neighboring town, who used the building for over thirty five years as a church.
A year after Manny died his mother, true to her word, sent the money to Louie. Louie instead used to money to purchase an over gate for the cemetery, with the name of the town emblazoned over it. It still stands at the front of the cemetery today. The school children of the day, formed a parade and carried flowers to the cemetery, to commemorate the occasion of the finished over gate. There is a brass plaque commemorating the gift.
Manny did not rest in peace! Having died while not in full control of his faculties, he was unaware that he was without a physical body. He was seen over the years by many of the church attendees. And people who wandered upstairs into the empty bedroom, unused by the church. When I first saw the hotel in the year 2000, I met Manny just outside the room # 2. I was with two friends, and following the previous owner throughout the maze of hallways and empty rooms on the second floor. My three companions were ahead of me in room #!, as I approached #2 , I caught a movement out of the corner of my eyes. I stopped and kept my vision forward. I saw a figure rise from a bed that no longer existed ! He was dressed in dark trousers, with a white shirt that had thin blue stripes in it. Suspenders, without a celluloid collar. He was about five feet four in height, and had dark curly hair, cut close to his head. He was communicating to me telepathically.
Written by Raymond Barry, owner of the Adams Hotel until his death on January 22, 2014.
Read on at the Adams Hotel Restoration Project
Public access?:
Yes. The building is today used as a community hall, holding a wide variety of events through the year.
Visting hours:
Highly variable
Website about the location and/or story: [Web Link]
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